A recent study showed that ECM stiffness correlates with increased glioma grade, while IDH-mut glioma exhibit reduced aggressiveness associated with reduced ECM stiffness and mechanical signaling, and in addition, IDH-mut glioma can mediate decreased tenascin-C and HA levels through down-regulation of HIF-1α (Miroshnikova et al., 2016), suggesting that differences in ECM composition in glioma are partially regulated by IDH mutational status. Here, HIF1A is linked to central nervous system cancer.